So, I suppose I'm back to AU. This would... probably never, ever happen in any episode, ever.

But that's what fanfiction is for!

Fabulous

Marc. Amanda. Betty. Hair and makeup. Sometimes, they just can't resist the opportunity to make something beautiful.

"Reading the makeover feature?"

"What? Oh! No, no! No, I was- I was-" Betty was trying desperately to hide the evidence in her hands, a copy of Mode very obviously open to an article about makeovers. Marc was grinning down at her, in his slightly eerie, wide-eyed, crazed-mouse fashion.

"Oh, honey, it's fine. Everyone wants a makeover now and then. Some need it more than others…"

"Okay, Marc, yeah, I get it."

"Just don't try that… whatever it was you did when you were supposed to meet Vincent Bianchi."

"Don't worry. I wasn't planning on doing that again any time soon. I'm… I'm not planning on doing anything. I'm just going to stay like this- it's better than making a bad situation worse, right?"

He didn't answer right away, and when she looked up, the expression on his face unnerved her. It was too pensive for Marc, too astute.

"I have work to do now, Marc."

He didn't move.

"Marc? You're creeping me out."

"Okay, okay, we're going to lunch."

"What?"

"You. Me. Lunch. Right now."

"What is this? Bizarro world?"

"Oh, just come on." He was tugging her out of her chair, eyes darting about nervously.

"Marc, what is wrong with you?"

"Shh! Just follow me."

She did.

"Where are we?"

"Hair and makeup. Remember that huge favor you asked for when you gave me my Gucci?"

"Yes…"

"This is it. Sit down."

"What? No, no, no. I get to name the favor."

"Yeah, sure, whatever. You need this. This is your favor. You will thank me. Sit!"

He pushed her into one of the chairs and tied one of the smocks around her neck before she could protest.

"What are you doing?"

He put his hands on her shoulders, firmly, and locked eyes with her reflection.

"I am giving you a makeover."

"WHAT?"

"Calm down, Carrie! It's just hair, and maybe a little makeup. No wardrobe or anything drastic. Besides, it's not like I'm doing it so I can pour pig's blood on you at prom or something. Jeez."

"Somehow I don't believe you."

Marc wasn't listening.

"Oh, Betty?"

"Yes?"

"If you ever tell anyone about this, I'll ruin you." He had the crazed-mouse look on his face again, and the scissors in his hand were large and very shiny. Betty swallowed and nodded.

"Sure thing. Got it. This never happened."

"Great. Now, let's get to work."

He kept her there for almost an hour, and refused to let her answer her phone when Daniel called. Halfway through, Amanda found them.

"Daniel was looking for- Oh. My. God. What is going on here?"

"I'm giving Betty a makeover! Shh, it's a secret."

"Well, Daniel is furious. He wants her right now. What should I tell him?"

"That you couldn't find her."

"And what do I get in return?"

"Ahhh…. You get to do her makeup!"

"Wait, what?"

"Quiet, Betty! And don't move, you'll ruin this cut."

"Um, Marc? I second Betty's opinion. Seriously, how is that good?"

"Well, I'm doing this because I just couldn't stand to see her awful hair for one more second. You get to do her makeup however you want! Make the sight of her face acceptable to you."

"Hey! That's not-"

"Okay! Sounds great. When do I get to start?"

"Oh, say, fifteen minutes?"

"Perfect." Amanda smiled at Betty in the mirror. She looked downright carnivorous.

Fifteen minutes later, Amanda was back in hair and makeup.

"Let me at her!"

"Okay, that is it! I do not appreciate being discussed like a-"

"Quiet, Betty!" Mark gave her the crazed-mouse look again. "Now, Amanda, you just have to wait one second- let me set this… here… perfect! All yours, sweetheart."

"Fabulous!" Amanda turned Betty's chair away from the mirror, and gazed at her face with the intensity of a butcher sizing up a new carcass. "Let's see… Right, got it. Betty, let's get rid of these."

Amanda pulled off Betty's glasses, and proceeded to poke and prod at her face and yell at her to stay still. She wielded the brushes and liners and pigment sticks like weaponry, which Betty supposed, in Amanda's world, they were.

Betty had to pucker her lips, purse her lips, puff out her cheeks, suck them in, close her eyes, open her eyes, close them again.

Then Amanda grabbed the tweezers.

Betty leapt from the chair.

Marc pushed her back down.

"Don't move!" They spoke in stereo, and Betty quailed with fear.

The tweezing didn't hurt as much as she'd thought it would, but the expectation of pain was bad enough.

After Amanda discarded the tweezers, she started back with more creams and puffs and powders. Fifteen minutes later, after Amanda had "just one more thing"-ed about twelve things, and Marc had finally finished pulling at her hair, she was allowed to look in the mirror once more.

"Well," Amanda sighed, "it was the best we could do."

"Aw, sweetheart, your makeup is brilliant!"

"Thank you! You did a pretty good job with the hair, too."

"The best I could. There wasn't much I could do about those bangs, though… God, why anyone would do that to themselves is just beyond-"

"Hey! Okay! Enough already! I get it! Hideous Betty rescued from style suicide by Marc and Amanda, fashion wonder twins!"

"Oh, I love the wonder twins!"

"Marc." Amanda was glaring at him.

"Right. Yes. Well, aren't you going to thank us?"

"Umm…" Betty peered at herself in the mirror. "I guess… I'm not sure… I mean…"

"Betty," Amanda leaned down, face-to-face with her sometime-adversary, "you look great. Well, for you anyway." She moved so that she was behind Betty, looking over her shoulder at the mirror. "Makeup, Betty, style, fashion… It's not about making you look like someone else. It's about making you look like yourself, only better."

"And you do look better." Marc again, pleased.

Betty spoke slowly, examining her reflection- the new Betty. Or, no- herself, only better. "You really think so?"

Marc leaned over her other shoulder. "We know so. Right, sweetie?"

"Right." Betty wasn't sure, but she thought Amanda's hands might have tightened on her shoulders as she echoed Marc's affirmation.

Amanda paused, staring at Betty's reflection, and her own. What the blonde was thinking, she might never have guessed.

She also though that the fashion wonder twins might have shared a malicious smile, so when she made her way back to her desk, she was perfectly ready to interpret every stare and every whisper as proof that she had been had, that she looked terrible.

She was ready to burst into tears by the time she got into Daniel's office. She was determined not to be reduced to tears by image again, certainly not in front of him, but the walk had proved much longer than she'd expected.

"Amanda said you were looking for me?"

He was facing away from her, looking at a mock-up. "Yeah. I've called. Where have you-" He turned, saw her, stopped. He was slack-jawed, and for Betty, it was the nail in the coffin.

"Oh, I knew it! I knew it, I knew it, I knew it! This looks horrible! How could I ever have trusted those-"

"Betty! Betty, stop!"

She took a sniffling breath.

"I'm sorry, I just-"

"You look…"

"Horrifying?"

"Fantastic."

She pulled her arms closer to herself, stuck her chin out a little. "You think?"

"I- yeah. You look… Wow."

She giggled.

"Well, not, I don't mean model wow, but, I- uh…"

"It's okay. You really think…?"

"Oh, absolutely."

She smiled at him, lips pressed together, and he thought for a moment that when she smiled like that, braces hidden, she was almost gorgeous. Well, she had potential.

Her hair was shinning, trimmed into great wavy sheets that framed her face perfectly. Her bangs had been smoothed as well, and parted asymmetrically along with her hair. They'd been trimmed, ever so slightly, so that they framed the top of her face and melted into the great long locks, rather than lying awkwardly against her forehead. And were those red highlights? They were faint, but he was almost certain they were there.

Her face looked- aside from those ridiculous glasses- perfect. It was still her face, but her skin tone had been smoothed out completely, her lips given just enough of color- a more dramatic shade of their natural tone- her cheeks barely dusted with blush, her eyes given just a touch of shadow, in a color that made her warm eyes even warmer. She looked like Betty, only better.

The clothes- everything besides her face- almost faded away utterly.

"Wow."

She giggled again, and her smile widened, braces showing. They weren't so bad, he supposed. Not great, but… She had a fabulous smile. Or she would have one, when the metal contraptions came off. How could he not have noticed it before? The potential had always been there and yet… No one had seen it.

Except… Sofia. Sofia had seen it. Sofia had seen it, and leapt at it, and he had… He looked down at the paper in his hand.

"Um, you got a call from Vincent Bianchi. He wanted to thank you for your Christmas present, and he wants you to call him back."

"Really?"

"Yeah, and, if you could get me a coffee? And call these people?" He handed her a little stack of post-its.

"Oh, sure, right away."

She took the papers and hurried out.

Daniel reached for a folder on his desk. Then he stopped. He put his hand in front of his face, eye-level. He stared. He looked at his other hand. He wished he had a napkin.

His palms were damp.
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